Something's Up with Jack
by ThirtySixBuns
Summary: During the first summer after gaining Jack Frost as a Guardian, the Guardians realize that they haven't the slightest idea of how to interact and take care of a seasonal sprite. While they love Jack a lot, the realization greets them like a slap in the face and forces them to take a step back and stop being so over protective of Frost. No pairings.
1. Chapter 1

Curious eyes looked over the setting, a fresh wind covering the Warren. The Endothermic fingers of one winter sprite running their way lazily across the leaf of a plant that was creeping over a dirt path. A yawn escaped the young lips of the boy, watching the frost articulate across the leaf, the water molecules around the plant sticking together to form the intricate patterns of the crystals.

After huffing a tired sigh, bare feet were pulled to the ground from their resting position against the tree. The staff in the humanoid's hand was used to pull the sprite to a standing position, looking around to see that he had sucked the heat from the surrounding area, making the usually bright and lively area look exhausted and lifeless. He sighed to himself a little sadly, feeling the heat turn into energy and livening himself up and making him feel a little better. He managed himself a small smile and beckoning the wind to lift him off of his feet. The wind could sense his intentions, and, albeit he didn't have any need to speak a word, he muttered a small _thanks_ to the old friend.

He curiously floated on, trying not to freeze everything in his vicinity. The Infamous Easter figure was nowhere in sight, frustrating the colder to no end. It was only a month after Easter, meaning that Bunny would have a couple more weeks before he would have to begin preparing for the next coming Easter. Jack, on the other hand, was restless with the warmth of summer and wished to see the _'kangaroo_' one last time before he began his hibernation cycle. Being one of the sprites of the northern hemisphere, Jack had the summers to sleep away in order to restore energy supplies from the warmth of the season.

For those who be curious, Frost gets his energy from the warm, rather than being weakened by it. Jack is an endothermic entity, absorbing energy in the form of heat and using that energy to expend joy across the regions that he tends to. Alongside that, he also acts as a grand conduit for the seasonal pressures that form around the areas, not letting the areas build up too much and cause storms of catastrophic levels.

Jack yawned again, the warmth of the warren sitting in him almost the way a warm turkey dinner would sit in an ordinary human. Deciding that he had put enough time into waiting for the other, Frost moved his staff and guided himself to the Sahara Desert, where he would spend the next four months sleeping under the sand and recharging his energy. None of the other sprites really knew where the Winter Sprites went in the summer, much how none of the Winter Sprites knew anything about their other seasonal counterparts. They seasons simply followed the wind and followed a silent pact to avoid each other unless the consequences would lead to a run-in with Mother Nature herself.

The wind help Jack by blowing a large crevasse into the sand dunes, reaching much lower than most would have thought possible for such a short time. Jack, once again, uttered his thanks to his silent friend, who ruffled his hair and laid him down into the sand, blowing it over the Winter Sprite. Jack curled up into a ball, his breath slowing and, according to many scribes of the human culture, died. His breathing ceased, his heart (which hadn't even been beating in the first place) was stopped, his skin appearing pale as death and cold as ice. However, Jack was simply sleeping once again, as he had done every year since the day he had been born.

When Jack was asleep his body did not decay because he lacked any oxygen that sustain any bacteria to rot his skin, and any other forms of life were frozen before they could possibly come into contact with one Jack Frost. Thanks to these amazing defensive tactics, Jack was able to sustain his perfectly normal habits for a few centuries.

He had, however, failed to inform the Guardians about this small fact. The blame couldn't possibly be given to anyone in this situation – the Guardians themselves failed to inquire about anything along the lines of what Jack did during the summer for they assumed that he went into the Southern Hemisphere and spread his share of winter in that part of the earth. Jack had no idea that it was normal to tell people that you would be gone for several months and that there was no need to worry about it. All in all, the situations was really quite humorous when looked back on several decades later. At the moment, on the contrary, the situation had caused quite a panic to all of the Guardians sans a certain Guardian of Fun who was blissfully sleeping away his summer in quiet ignorance.

After Jack had settled down, the wind having moved the dunes in order to properly protect its precious Guardian, the Pooka named Aster had emerged from his hole, ready to look for Jack and (although he would _never_ admit it) hang out with the misjudged kid.

All of the post-Easter cleaning had been taken care of and for the next several weeks Aster had nothing to worry about aside from relaxing after a job well done. This was the first year, however, that Aster would have a Winter Sprite to annoy with his free time. He was looking forward to the bantering between him and Frost that would, for the most part, be considered friendly. Albeit he would never let this little fact slip to anyone of the other Guardians, or even to the Moon himself, Aster had taken a bit of a liking to the Human, enjoy the others company much more than he would ever care to admit.

When Aster stepped out of his burrow (which was quite literally a hole in the ground with a nest, and the only time that was passed there was spent sleeping), he was met with the familiar scent of the Winter Sprite and he bound off to follow it, realizing that it was quickly fading. After near ten minutes, Aster realized fully that Jack wasn't there and decided to drop by the Guardian of Baubles to find him, tapping his foot and appear through the closest tunnel to North's door. He sprinted to the haven of warmth, knocking and being let in by a Yeti that Aster had never bother to learn the name of. Almost instantly Aster realized that Frost would not be there due to the lack of the smell of the boy. However, he knew that he couldn't escape to locate the other quickly because there was the all too family sound of leather boots on hard wooden floors.

Santa Clause had found him and he was in for a long conversation about which holiday was better that would probably end up in some (definitely _not_ nonalcoholic) eggnog. Although he had nothing wrong his this – it was actually something he commonly did right after Easter or Christmas – that was not what he wanted at the moment. He wanted to see the little carefree Guardian and to talk about what had happened between the two. After about an hour of conversing, North decided that he didn't want to keep the fidgeting Pooka waiting any long and let Bunny on his way, making his way back to his own study to idly design more toys for the kids of the world.

Bunny had no more luck at Tooth Palace, instead getting a face full of fairies and some distracted responses whilst a certain Fairy talked to her minions at hyper speed, her wings fluttering at the rate of a humming bird's. He sighed to himself, leaving and deciding against asking the Sandman for help on his quest for Jack due to his inability to understand the signs of the shorter.

The next two weeks went on like so, until all of the Guardians took note of the fact that Frost was missing. None of them even had a clue as to what to do.


	2. Chapter 2

After a desperate summons of the Northern Lights and scourging the face of the earth for the Frost Sprite, the four original Guardians realized that they had no idea what they were looking for. Albeit it would be convenient to find a mess of white hair and frost, they couldn't find him anywhere that there was winter, and all traces of him were dead ends. Burgess was too thawed out, none of the sanctuaries of the Guardians contained any signs of the boy, and the only possible scent that could be found of him was in the middle of a desert, which would be far too warm for a Winter Sprite to reside.

The four of them held a meeting on the subject, talking about the fact and coming to the decision that the next best option would be to research the sprites of winter in order to understand where Jack might be. After three days of searching North's library, they found that the only thing that was harder to find than Jack was information about Jack.

After two months of looking tirelessly, they had to accept the fact that they couldn't waste any more time on looking for the kid. He could take care of himself, surely, and the Guardians had jobs to do. Winter was fast to sneak up on them and the preparations of chocolates for Easter could never be started too early in the year. Because of this, they left Jack to his own devices, hoping that he would return in time like a lost dog, safe and sound with his collar intact.

After the two months, North threw himself into the work for his holiday, doing everything in a guilty haste. His temper was shorter than it had been, causing a number of angry outbursts resulting in the destruction of perfectly good ice. Not even the soothing sounds of long lost Russian symphonies could raise his spirits. He knew perfectly well that Jack would be perfectly fine, however, he felt like he took the fatherly position in this family and that he had failed Jack in his protective services in some form. That wasn't something that he was quite ready to face, still mourning the three hundred years that he had let the child wander alone.

Tooth, however, found herself getting distracted constantly and not being able to keep up with her work. The fairies had gone into autopilot, collecting teeth in time but not organizing them into the systems at the tempo that they should have. This stupor would be putting her almost an entire decade behind on her organization tactics, which was terrible because she already struggled with organization and grime and remaining clean. The entire situation had her baffled and a shade guilty for crimes that she couldn't recall committing.

Bunny found himself cleaning and eating much more than he usually did. Sure, his Warren was already extremely clean and he didn't need to eat seven meals a day rather than his usual three and a half, but it calmed him down, so he let his (nearly manic) behavior take over and he rearranged and swept his burrow (even though it had a dirt floor) and he just let himself worry senselessly over his dear friend Jack.

Sandy had no idea why the heck everyone was so worried, and, quite frankly, didn't quite care. He didn't know that they were worried about Jack because if he had he would have told them that he spread dreams of snow that didn't push people to stay inside and people appreciating the fun that a sprite spread in the middle of a desert. Instead he slept through some of the boring-as-math meetings, unheeded and ignored in his undisrupted silence. That was what kept him and everyone else happy, so he didn't bother with trying to fix things like how the other Guardians felt or how he could fix it. If they lost any sleep to it then he would start to worry, but until that day he would stay out of it.

It wasn't until part was through the third month that Bunny had begun to have the nightmares of Jack never returning – the nightmares being one born of stress and guilt rather than the boogeyman. When Sandy noticed that, he peaked in on the sleeping rabbit, whispering quietly in his ear to wake him up. That certainly did the trick, and he inquired of Bunny what was bothering the over-sized rodent.

"Well, Jack's still missing, you know? And what if he doesn't return?" Bunny recited his fears without pause to the trusting figure. Sanderson raised an eyebrow before questioningly making the symbol of a snowflake, quickly followed by an arrow to himself.

Bunny stared at the signs blankly before replying tiredly. "You think you're Jack? Don't be silly Sandy."

The elder Guardian shook his head quickly, making a small map that had the Sahara Desert with a small snowflake and an arrow. The arrow pointed to the map, making Sandy's point more clear.

"It's snowing in the desert? So? I'm sure it's happened before or something," the Pooka responded before his ears shot up in realization. "Do you mean that Jack's in the desert?"

Sandy nodded eagerly, smiling and tugging the paw of the other Guardian quickly. He dragged the Aussie to the place that the sprite was residing, slowly explaining what was happening with the Winter Sprite in sign language so that Aster didn't attempt to wake Jack up or anything ridiculous like that.

After Aster understood he spread the news to the rest of the Guardians, and they all made a silent agreement – that they wouldn't let Sandy sleep during any more of the meetings. Also, that they wouldn't be freaking out over the fact that they can't completely protect their youngest member. The second, however, was deemed more important to all sans Aster, who simply worried more about the smaller.

Not that he would admit that to any of the other Guardians.


End file.
